Island Surprise

This past weekend marked our first vacation in Malawi. Our friends are here and we have spent the better part of our first three weeks in Chezi, so we decided it was time to explore a little bit. What better place for our first Malawi adventure than Lake Malawi? Friday afternoon we headed out for what we thought was a 2-hour drive. Four hours and many, many kilometers of potholed dirt road later we found ourselves in the dark with our car barely climbing a treacherous mountain road. The last thing we expected to find was our destination, let alone two lovely western women greeting us with Carlsberg beers, much needed peanuts and a chance to calm our nerves.

Soon after we were joined by our Malawian friends, Ralph and Miriam (whose journey made ours look like heaven) and the eight of us took a 30-minute boat ride to Domwe Island. We woke up the next morning to see our home for the weekend a beautiful island for just us. The weekend was full of kayaking, snorkeling, hikes, fresh fish bought from a local fisherman riding by in his canoe, no electricity and an amazing sunset on Saturday night. It was great to see the country from a different perspective. To date our time here has been exclusively devoted to seeing and working with the many problems that the country faces. This past weekend gave us a chance to the very beautiful and untouched part of Malawi.